Spielberg 'Secret Service' Keeps 'Skull' Secrets Safe

By Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith
With reports by Stephanie DuBois and Emily Feimster

John Hurt confirmed this week that "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" will open at the Cannes Film Festival -- and you'd better believe it won't be a moment too soon, in terms of Steven Spielberg's gargantuan efforts to keep the picture's secrets secret.

"We did a stunt on every major studio lot in town," reports Dimitri Diatchenko, who plays Cate Blanchett's right-hand Russian henchman in the film due out May 22. "It was pretty hard, considering the news and paparazzi and helicopters flying over. If it was an outside set, there were helicopters over us. It was tough. I'm sure he had to pull a couple of strings to clear air space over Universal Studios."

He adds that Spielberg hired "a special team of people, almost like a Secret Service for the movie. All they would do was make sure nothing got out, make sure the scripts were with whom they're supposed to be."

Originally scheduled for just 10 days of shooting, Diatchenko says Spielberg singled him out during principal photography in Connecticut.

"Steven was like, 'We've got to improvise a lot of the stuff with the Russians,' then, after one take, the First AD comes up and says, 'The Gov wants to see you in the tent. The Gov, of course, is Steven Spielberg.'

"So, I go in there and Steven says, 'Hey, Dimitri, sit down here. We're going to watch this last take and, by the way, this is George Lucas, Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy.' He rewinds and everybody starts laughing and he goes, 'That's great. I really like that, a big funny guy. I want you in the rest of the movie.' So, after that, I go to go to Hawaii for three-and-a-half weeks, then we finished it up in L.A."

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